


The Price to Pay, the Minimum of Madness

by Sukila



Series: Hello Charlotte Week (Sept. 22 - 28) [3]
Category: Hello Charlotte (Video Game), Hello Charlotte (Video Games)
Genre: #hellocharlotteweek, Angst with a Happy Ending, Animal Traits, Animalistic, Blood and Gore, Brain Damage, Cold, Darkness, Desperation, Dismemberment, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Emotionally Repressed, Fear, Hair Loss, Hallucinations, Handcuffs, Hello Charlotte Week - Day 3, Help, Human Experimentation, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Imprisonment, Insanity, Isolation, Loss of Limbs, Loss of Parent(s), Memories, Mentions of Mercy Killing, Needles, Night Terrors, Pain, Permanent Injury, Repressed Memories, Semi-Somniphobia, Sleep Deprivation, Speech Disorders, Starvation, Temporary Amnesia, Temporary Blindness, Touch-Starved, Unethical Experimentation, Vomiting, please help this small child, so much pain, so much screaming, technically, temporary deafness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-24
Updated: 2018-09-24
Packaged: 2019-07-16 06:51:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16080767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sukila/pseuds/Sukila
Summary: “Charlotte…” They’d said, tone thick, as though it was hard to force the words out.He waited a moment, the silence crashing down upon them both through the staredown, his face shifted into a sort of regret, and he had begun to turn around when she finally managed.“Ben...net-t…” She called, her hand reaching out towards him as she leaned forwards, lifting herself off her knees to try and crawl a bit closer. Shock turned back to sadness, then to disgust as a gloved hand came to his mouth, the other slipping off the door to do the same. She scrambled forwards to meet him, hand still extended as the door slammed shut, her forehead colliding against it with an audible thump!“N-Nooo! Benn...ett! Bennett!” She’d screamed, ripped nails still trying to claw her way to the familiar figure, to plead for his help, for the reason why he’d left her. The heavy door rattled beneath her small fists, and the banging went on until her knuckles began to pain too greatly to continue.It was the last time anyone had come, and, sometimes, she’s sure it was just a hallucination.





	The Price to Pay, the Minimum of Madness

**Author's Note:**

> Endgame semi-inspired by my own troubles walking after pulling a load of leg muscles and a part of The Girl Who Can Fly, a book I read a million years ago before I discovered fanfiction and fell down this massive rabbit hole.

She could see it in every little movement, breaths taken and turned white in the freezing cold, and a feeling of festering nerves. They flickered with fear and desperation, sadness and unsurety, wishes and wants… She’d count each huff and puff as her finger traced the scratch marks on the marble of the smooth flooring.

 

Always dim, as though darkness was leaking in, slowly but surely, ready to drown her when it finally reached the top of the room. It was absurd, really, for there was nothing there but empty space, and cold air that pressed against her when her arm reached out.

 

Despite the darkness, the room remained as white as her hair, a few shades brighter than the pale tones of sickly skin; marred by track marks and imperfections from the sleepy times. She didn’t sleep much anymore, not after discovering the memories of scalpels digging into her arm whenever she fell into herself in the night. Instead she stared, counted those shallow breaths, louder than any silence and enough to keep her sane.

 

Sometimes, like a rare treat, she’d hear the whispers turn to screeches as the captives fight, as the lab’s workers party, as she begins to ignore the blood of a worn throat and releases sound after sound. It sounded like a wounded animal, and on that note, she wasn’t sure what she was anymore, was she?

 

Perhaps they were all human once, perhaps they’d lost that somewhere along the way, or perhaps it was always like this. Buried in fog, haunted by nightmares displaying the truth, screaming and screaming and _screaming_ whenever they could; never to be answered.

 

And Charlotte let out a sigh that time, brushing her fingers together as she lay on the floor, watching that door with no real thoughts in mind; it was okay, pain would be here soon; something familiar.

 

There was nothing to be sad about.

 

-

 

There was pain in her wrists, clasped together by frozen metal as those voices argued in nonsensical white noise. So loud, so bright, rattling her fragile mind and creating a blaring siren in her head that made it pulse agonisingly.

 

She couldn’t help the groan, nor the flinch as a worker investigated, filling blurry vision with yellow, a tired body with some sort of substance. Perhaps it was meant to replace as the reddish fluid they’d been draining from her, it had turned pink recently, other days it glowed like the lights on fireflies, bright and blue and almost beautiful.

 

She began to shake, after that, but not in cold, her dry lips trying to reject the formula with a foamy sort of additive as well. The jerks of her body without permission sending her flying off the table and crashing to the ground, losing awareness with a simple _smack_ of her head onto that same marble, even whiter under the bright lights of the alternate room.

 

She dreamed of sunlight, something she could barely even remember, and of faceless beings she might have once known so well. In that way, perhaps she was far too human.

 

-

 

The red marks still burned when her finger trailed against them, they were usually so careful, leaving aches and irritation when she shifted her body, but nothing more; it was a mistake, wasn’t it? Just like the chunks of hair in the beginning of confinement, so much of the fluffy mass lying about the floor, tucked away into impatient hands.

 

“Too far…!” She’d heard one yell at the top of their lungs, sounding tearful and worrisome. The next day, they’d cut it in the night, short, short, short, just like when she was young. She couldn’t occupy her hands in braiding it anymore, the restlessness inspiring broken nails and bloody smears of nails turned to claws in desperation.

 

The door had opened, she recalled, light flooding in to shine on her pathetic form on the ground. Coated in her own blood, eyes shimmering with tears, teeth bared in frustrated, fearful growls like an animal backed into a corner.

 

Because she was angry at the world, sad for herself, and all out of anything to hope for after what could’ve only been days of isolation. She’d been met with a tired face and their grimace as they held a sad expression, fluffy yellow strands blending into their uniform’s colour and imperfections on their face, just like her, now.

 

“Charlotte…” They’d said, tone thick, as though it was hard to force the words out. He’d never said her name before, had he? It was enough to lure her gaze from her blood-stained hands, and up towards him, displaying that same, sad, little look that begged for pity.

 

He waited a moment, the silence crashing down upon them both through the staredown, his face shifted into a sort of regret, and he had begun to turn around when she finally managed.

 

“Ben...net-t…” She called, her hand reaching out towards him as she leaned forwards, lifting herself off her knees to try and crawl a bit closer. Shock turned back to sadness, then to disgust as a gloved hand came to his mouth, the other slipping off the door to do the same. She scrambled forwards to meet him, hand still extended as the door slammed shut, her forehead colliding against it with an audible _thump!_

 

“N-Nooo! Benn...ett! _Bennett!”_ She’d screamed, ripped nails still trying to claw her way to the familiar figure, to plead for his help, for the reason why he’d left her. The heavy door rattled beneath her small fists, and the banging went on until her knuckles began to pain too greatly to continue.

 

It was the last time anyone had come, and, sometimes, she’s sure it was just a hallucination.

 

-

 

What was wrong with her?

 

It was a question Charlotte pondered as often as she had time to spare, knocking her head against the wall and stopping to pressing her forehead to it when she became too dizzy. Perhaps she’d done something wrong, something so horrible even she couldn’t fathom it.

 

She trailed a hand through her hair, curing it around a chunk and being careful not to pull; it had the same texture as her ratty blanket, and was course, sticky, and brittle. She had a place in this small world of hers, between walls 2 and 3, nestled into the corner on that thin, little mattress of hers; the only thing that was hers anymore.

 

She had a place here, so maybe she didn’t belong anywhere else… Just here with a mess of stained, old cushions and fabric, as comfortable as the rest of the cold, but a grateful distraction from the hard floor.

 

In the same, mint-coloured gown after her sweater had been torn to shreds in a fit of madness and frustration.

 

The same room she’d known for a time unknown, in the same invisible blizzard, watching her breaths, ignoring the coppery taste in her mouth and the occasional disgust over the lingering smell of vomit.

 

Watching the door outlined by thin seams, nearly invisible in the darkness she’d become so accustomed to after so many bite marks on her hands during ‘meals.’

 

Normally, she wasn’t one to be cynical or sarcastic, too lost in the meanings of everything to interpret the words as more, but, even to her, calling them real meals would be a lie. Little cans of what tasted like Magcat’s food, a label present that only said, ‘Ration,’ and a cup of something that reminded her of mouthwash, albeit more unpleasant. It bubbled in a way that suggested spoiling rather than cleanliness or carbonated drinks, smelling of rot with the foul aftertaste making it clear it was never meant to burn with the flavour of bubble gum.

 

The portions shrunk with her body, as though they were trying to prevent any being wasted, it had happened so gradually, she’d barely even noticed that, one day, the can was no longer heavier than the cup.

 

Still, even that was barely different, life went on in monotony, with changes being something to fear, eventually, as each tended to result in the worsening of either her mind or body.

 

Her hands fell from her hair, hugging her arms as she curled up, still facing the door, she settled, letting her breaths roll out on their own and trying to ignore the wetness in her lungs. And late into the night, she fell into dreams, a hand having crept down past her yellow ribbon’s place on her thigh to hold the stump of her right leg and pick at the frozen, ragged pattern of flesh where the rest once attached below her knee.

 

There was nothing but near-silent shuffling as they took her.

 

-

 

When she woke up this time, she was almost certain she had died. The room was warm, but not uncomfortably so like it was under the lab’s fluorescent lighting. The walls were a pale pink and a fake window was painted to look like a sunset, fairy lights hanging down setting off a dim, orange lighting.

 

The omnicubes hummed, rattling in annoyance over the dust that had settled within them. Box upon box of soap stacked atop them as though they were in need of a firm hand after acting aggressively.

 

They slipped off the sheer white sheets of their old bed, empty of its usual pile of blankets, which had been neatly folded and stacked in one corner. The carpet felt strange beneath her bare foot after so much time away...the pink strands of cottony fibers giving her an easy rug burn after she limped and fell, unused to the lack of flatness.

 

She came down in a heap, making a muffled thump and avoiding the telltale beginnings of bruises thanks to the odd softness. With her face to the floor, legs still raised up at the knee, she thought of the vivid cracks of bones snapping as she hit the floor so many times before; the memory soothed her anxiousness over the change, and she rolled over.

 

It started, again, with a voice, a thick, angry tone in a shrill voice that demanded attention and change, “This is a difficult transition, we can’t expect immediate results!” She’d shouted, hand holding the doorknob and shaking it lightly as her emotions became more and more volatile, the door cracked to reveal a worker throwing about their free arm and pointing rampantly at their opposite.

 

Florence, it _was_ Florence, wasn’t it? It was hard to remember much anymore by then, with Bennett’s mess of an entrance being written off as a lucid dream. In either case, the hair was still blue and bright but lacking in upkeep, with roots coming in the colour of an ash tree’s trunk. Just like her dream of Bennett, she looked tired, slouched over and stepping carefully in her approach.

 

“Hey… I-” She stopped to take a breath, eyes diluting with sympathy as Charlotte let her head fall to the side in question with an audible _snap!_ “Charlotte… You…”

 

She had smiled at her, still lying against the wall, vision spinning sideways and limbs splayed out around her, “Fl-Flurrrrr- Flourrrrr-ence,” she attempting, taking in deep breaths as spiddle dripped down the sides of her mouth.

 

Florence’s eyes seemed to snap to the missing chunk of leg as she fidgeted, “What have we done to you…?” She seemed to ask herself, creeping towards the girl opposite and matching her height, reaching out a hand to calm Charlotte as she flinched, “Your… Your leg…” Her hand went to grip the false arm on her side, nails digging into the yellow sleeve; such a familiar situation.

 

It left herself quickly enough, making its way towards the short white hair, still falling out as the strands quickly turned brittle; it was completely matted with filth. But the gloved girl didn’t seem to mind, letting a hand rest lightly, and Charlotte picked up her opposite hand and fixed her head, letting her face rest against the arm of Florence. Contentment lured her into relaxation, her eyes closed and felt at ease at the idea of another person’s touch.

 

She fell asleep _with_ someone that day, and woke up alone; just another dream where someone promised change.

 

Perhaps this room was one too, and soon she’d wake in that same little cell where change is a reason to cower, and she’ll never again dwell on those night time explorations called happy dreams.

 

-

 

But the room wasn’t fake, because she’d woken up in there after a long night of avoiding the return, and there she was again.

 

Tucked beneath the covers, bandages around her arms and stump, and a big sweater hanging off her tiny body, the minty gown nowhere to be found, just like the filth. It would be almost loving if she still weren’t so sure it was a dream, some hallucination by another of their nightly experiments.

 

She occupied herself with looking at the ceiling, scratching out the pictures made of fissures onto the painted walls as they turn brighter and darker under the changing glow of the lights. The room was ever-changing, in that way, and each time they fluttered so did her heart, the palpitations growing stronger.

 

Little patterns chasing her about like a stalking predator searching for easy prey, her creations, yet meant to put down their own god. Dragons flew about, breathing frost in through holes in the plaster, fluffy citizens nearly frozen solid by the sheer change in temperature she was afraid to go near. She remembered looking through one, into the brightly lite halls leaking cold air from broken pipes.

 

“C-Coaa-coaall-dah,” she’d slurred out, leaning against the farest wall, listening to the chaos as people milled about and their footsteps ran wild in her ears like a stampede of needy...what were they called again? Those...stripe...legged...things? Regardless, it was hard to hear herself think after becoming so accustomed to silence, and there was only a single person who came to a stop.

 

“Cold?” He asked, trying to act casual as nothing but the wall kept their leaning forms from colliding. She could see a wisp of pinkish hair through the slit, and tried to recall what was associated with it and its voice of tired, annoyed, and curious all at once.

 

“Ffff...Feeel...Feeel-is,” Charlotte tried, growling a bit in frustration at herself for not being able to be clear when someone was finally making sense, “ _Feeel_ -ix, s- _see_ wha- Wha-iee-tu?”

 

She couldn’t see him frown, and examine the leaking air above, nor the short motion as he took deep breaths and watched the glimpses of outtake as his insides froze a bit. It was just the smallest puff of visible air...but enough to show a substantial difference… What was he doing _now?_

 

“I...Ie’mah- here, wha- Wha-ee?” Came the slurred dialogue through shallow breaths, full of effort and a desperate attempt to be heard after so, _so_ long, “Nn...Nnnew…”

 

There was no response.

 

“Feel-ix…!” She shouted, fearing she’d been drowned out by the buzzing sound that had seemed to come all at once, turning her words into nothingness, “Felixx…!” She inaudibly groaned, hands clasped over her ears as she fell to the floor and tried, tried, _tried_ to stop the buzzing and ringing of alarms.

 

That was the last day she knew the sound of true, dead silence, now haunted by angry whispers and the smallest, yet loudest, of static.

 

She didn’t try talking again, after that, instead opting to focus on the ghostly sensation of a missing hand’s stump from where it had melted away just beneath the elbow.

 

-

 

Creeping towards her, holding out a hand as if to pacify. She growled, snapping at the offending limb as it came close, making her best attempt to be threatening despite being unable to identify the volume of her own sounds.

 

It came again, something small and red in its black palm that she investigated in the darkness of beneath the bed. Eventually, her hand snatched it quick as she could, eyes growing wide as it began to glow lightly before bursting into a flash of white. She whined, shielding her eyes from the object and fighting as they grabbed at her, still blinded, frightened, and deaf.

 

Trying to bite and bark got nothing but a hand pressed against her mouth, tasting of window cleaner and seemingly unaffected her attempts to dislodge it. Tears of frustration flooded her eyes, only growing more desperate as she writhed and began to fear death. It worsened greatly when the ringing of her ears began again, with no movement allowing her to rub her head against the carpet in an attempt to muffle it.

 

Eventually, it dissipated, bringing in new sounds she had become unfamiliar with all too quickly; voices.

 

“Are they working? She seems to have calmed down…”

 

“Hey! Human!” Charlotte growled, creeping open her eyes to glare at the blonde holding her head between his arms, “I think she looked at me!” He shouted triumphantly, smiling down at her. It was strange...it gave her the urge to calm, and maybe smile back; she forced it down as best she could, panic overtaking the loving senses with fouler memories of bloodied nails and abandonment.

 

“Did you two take care of Huxley?” The smallest asked a grouping of two, practically attached at the hip.

 

“Yep!” One said.

 

“Out of the picture,” the other added, slapping his gloved hand against the first’s in an odd gesture of victory.

 

“Good…”

 

The girl from earlier seemed apprehensive, “I’m not sure how to feel about it, but… What he did to Charlotte was… It was just like on Überia…” She sighed, directing her gaze towards the semi-feral girl, “And we took part…”

 

“How were we supposed to argue with him, anyways?” The blonde chimed in once more, cheerful tone hiding more sympathetic and sorrowful thoughts, “We were all his lab rats, once!”

 

The room turned silent, and he soon piped up again in confusion, “What?”

 

There was a collective sigh, _“Anyways,_ is there any possible way to...fix this? What was he even trying to do?”

 

“I read the notes dozens of times, but it’s still almost impossible to decipher. From what I can make out, though, she already had the virus…”

 

“That _thing_ was inside of her from the start?” He didn’t respond, “Felix?”

 

Felix huffed, brushing the hair from his face in a bothered gesture, like it was the only way he knew how to respond, _“Yes,_ The Oracle was present from the start, but...it only became active when my uncle- When _Huxley_ began messing with it. In trying to gather its components...he turned it into a monster…”

 

“He turned _her,_ into a monster.”

 

_“Please! It hurts! Stop this, please! I- I don’t-” Her voice was cut off by a series of gurgles as she choked on the ink and blood flooding in through her throat and drowning the tiles in a thick substance that dried and cracked apart like crude cement, “Guah! W-Why…? How...could...you...Hux...ley…?”_

 

_“Easily,” he replied to the comatose girl, eyes holding a hint of yellow, a jaded smile beneath the mask he wore, “I just followed the doctor’s instructions.”_

 

“A monster who ate herself from the inside out.”

 

_Bang! Bang! Bang! Angry fists hammering against the door and accompanied by heinous, blood curdling screams of a child in pain, trapped in fear coated with darkness and solitude._

 

_Once, just a single time, he came to answer, eyes still coated in a vicious, all-consuming yellow, “Satisfied, little god?”_

 

_“Umbrella...Man…?”_

 

_“Not exactly. There’s still quite a lot of the doctor in here.”_

 

_“Why…? Whatta ‘bout, Seth?” She slurs, growing more and more tired as she looks upon the enlightened figure of the halls, still trying to crawl her way over, slowly but surely._

 

_“I’m afraid he cannot interfere with a body of your current...modifications,” he took off the mask for a moment, showing off an eerie smile, “Do not worry, you aren’t on your own.”_

 

_“Wait…!” She tried, weak legs unable to carry her weight and soon...losing...their...tangibility… The door slammed shut, and she fell, looking down to find the limb missing, and her body right back where it had started, like it was all a hopeful dream, “I...I don’t understand…!”_

 

“Mind and all.”

 

_And she screamed for hours, the same phrase, accompanied by meaningless, desperate, needy sounds during the in between._

 

She didn’t notice the return of the heavy tears, so big in her eyes as they trailed down her face, clearer than they’d ever been in that dingy room, where they left trails through the smeared dirt and became tinted with filth. Bennett’s hold shifted until she was simply sitting in his arms, wiping away at her eyes with the only hand she had left and finally coming to a sad conclusion about all she’d lost.

 

A few wept with her, with Florence’s little words bringing out a new side of their tale, “It’s funny...on Überia, she’d already be dead, huh? The same mercy Aiden tried to give her with that cold spell…”

 

It was too big a truth for their little minds, that friends were gone and the savior had become what they’d most feared; just another one of the Overmen. A capability that took the bare minimum of both madness and interference.

 

_WOULD YOU LIKE TO SAVE THE CHILD?_

 

_Please… I’d do anything to help her, if I could! Can’t you-?_

 

_You’re willing to pay the costs?_

 

_Yes, ...I’m sorry, Charlotte…_

 

-

 

“Shh- Shhharrr- Charrr-lot.”

 

“That’s right! Can’t believe you got that one, human maggot!”

 

She smiled, kicking her legs as she sat on the stool, metal whirring loudly at the hasty movements, “Thhh- Thann-kx, Bennett!”

 

He put the crudely made flashcards down in a heap, letting them form a messy pile on the table that shifted about, “Let’s go bother, Honikker!”

 

She giggled, grabbing at his hand and limping ahead as fast as she could, “Yeah!”

 

“Don’t slip, you dumbies!” Florence called to them as they came by, passing Charlotte her brace with a knowing smile, “I have to adjust those prosthetics enough as is!”

 

“We- We’re varrry ca-ka- carefull!” She responded, breathing already turning harsh, sweat on her brow from the effort movement took, Florence shook her head in response, making her lean against the wall for a moment as she put her long hair up and out of her face (it had never properly grown back, but the scraps of times past made a nice replacement, though she wasn’t eager to cut any of it despite the too-long bangs), “Thanx!”

 

As usual, the twins were running about through the halls carrying this and that, she tried to wave but nearly fell flat on her face, with her arm just barely being caught by Bennett before the dive was completed; she gave him a smile as gratitude.

 

The house was quieter without Aiden, but it was a quiet they grew used to as they all grew themselves, and was easily filled by the stomping of rubber-tipped metal on the wooden and tile floors as she ran about.

 

Felix was in the greenhouse, artificially lite, of course, having been made from the old lab once filled to the brim with spiders; the plant life almost looked out of control, coursing throughout ancient halls of former imprisonment, but they knew Felix was meticulously handling them. The walls were lined with false panels of ‘glass’ she’d filled in with drawings of the outside, family portraits and the like. Many pictured her rescue, past memories she didn’t want to forget despite sour feelings, and the thrilling story of the day she became her own person again.

 

She could still see it, if she wanted to, in the remnants of the dark room, held in jars of flesh and contaminants still housing it in her old flesh. It didn’t grow back as well as that of the aliens, but it had tried, and that was what counted.

 

Felix sighed as they came in, knowing who it was, yet couldn’t wipe the smile off his face (though whether it was for her or his plants she wasn’t sure), “Shouldn’t you be studying or something?”

 

“Da-onn,” she said simply, “What’re yu sti-stille do-ing?”

 

“Alright…” He conceded, despite the flawed logic, “We’ll go make some food…”

 

Her mouth began to water, and she gave a happy sort of yip at the thought of spending time with him today instead of just chasing down Magcat until he was done, “Yayyy!”

 

She looked back, deep into the hall, past Bennett, and cocked her head, “Com-ing, Sss-Sethh?”

 

He gave a sad smile, averting his eyes almost immediately.

 

“Sorry… Not today, Charlotte.”

 

She tried to hide her disappointment, he’d been like this ever since they’d been separated by the Oracle, “Aoh-kay.”

 

If only she could help him when he sat down and cried whenever he looked at her like this, she wished she could tell him there was nothing to be sad about!

 

But...deep down, something nagged at her not to tell a lie like that, even if she didn’t see why it was untrue, after all, they were free now!

 

And with that thought in mind, she smiled instead, hobbling towards happiness with the kind of determination only a child could have.

 

And slowly but surely, the story ended, and Seth let her be, and faded away, if only to keep her from his own mistakes again, and to preserve this sort of happy ending, and the lopsided smile of a girl covered in the marks of stitches and stretched skin.


End file.
